BY CASEY MINER AND HUDA AHMED  The 12th St. corridor in Oakland is a 12-lane freeway sandwiched between two perfectly normal city streets. There are no crosswalks or traffic lights, but morning commuters don’t care; the quickest way to BART is to look both ways and hope for the best.

Oakland’s “Unity for the Sake of Change” Presidential Inauguration
Community Viewing at the Oracle Arena
January 20, 2009
Presented in part by Alameda County Board of Supervisor’s Keith
Carson, District 5 Supervisor.

By Anna McCarthy/510 Report
“Happy New Year’s Eve, I love you, and may God Bless Your Family.”
That was the text that Cephus Johnson said he sent to his nephew, 22-year-old Oscar Grant III, at 12:49 a.m. on Thursday.  But Grant never responded, and a little more than an hour later he was shot in the back and killed on the Fruitvale BART station platform by a BART police officer, according to cell-phone videos and eye-witness accounts of the incident.
BART officials said there is no video footage of the incident available from …

By Mateen Kaul –
The Indian community gathered in large numbers at the Milpitas Indian Community Center on Thursday, December 4, to remember the victims of the militant attacks in Mumbai.
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[audio:http://rosebud.journalism.berkeley.edu/~j200/510report/mumbaifinal.mp3]

By Angela Kilduff
Like any superhero, mystery surrounds the true identity of the Vagina Lady. She makes appearances at Bay Area events wearing a cape and a plush, pink vagina costume nearly as tall as she is. Even among the unusual characters San Francisco is known for, she stands out in a crowd.
In her other life, Julie Vanadis, 30, is a writer and editor. Her co-workers don’t know about the character she plays, so she uses an alternate last name in interviews.  She prefers to keep her personal life and role …

Photos and Story by Linsay Rousseau Burnett
Robert Wesner, 39, sat hunched over his sewing machine, his waist-long hair pulled back in a half ponytail, while a topless woman laced up a leather corset behind him. Wesner, owner of Leather Mystics, began stitching together his sixth leather choker of the night. Laughing, he said that he never would have believed this is where his life would end up: “It’s not like you grow up thinking, ‘Geez, I think I’ll be a bondage leather specialist.”

By Karen Weise
The ceremony commemorating the 140th anniversary of the Hayward Fault earthquake emphasized the urgency of learning from the magnitude 6.8 trembler in order to minimize devastation from future quakes. Calling for greater disaster preparedness, the ceremony blended history and science about the quake to jolt the public and officials into action.

By Casey Miner  A rally in support of Proposition 8, the ballot measure that would ban same-sex marriage in California, turned ugly as supporters of the measure taunted passersby and counter-demonstrators near Lake Merritt in Oakland.
The demonstrators yelled slurs like “faggot,” according to several people who said they were harassed. Some said they were pushed, poked, and hit with signs by aggressive demonstrators.